If
by elanev91
Summary: Very angsty fic where I, for some reason, pretend that Jily can see end-of-OotP Harry from beyond the grave.


**I don't know what's wrong with me this morning. Here's this sad thing. Excuse me while I go cry in my bed for the next hour. xx**

* * *

If she can see this, from wherever they are, it's killing her.

It's shattering her heart, or whatever is where her heart is supposed to be, making her chest ache and her stomach twist up in knots so tightly tied she's not sure how they'll ever come undone.

It's close to what she's felt before, if she can feel it, the anger from watching him grow up. Seeing him abused and lied to and mistreated and left with no idea of who he is, who _they_ are until he's old enough that he has almost no chance of remembering the time that they did get to spend together. That ripped her heart apart, set her teeth on edge, because she'd wanted him to remember, wanted him to have something to hold onto, needed him to know how much they loved him, but he doesn't. At least, he didn't.

But this - _this_ is different and if she can hear him screaming, the words are hitting her in the chest like bullets, each one carving its way through her, making her chest crack with pain and longing because all she wants is to hold him, to tell him that, no, it isn't okay, but she's there, and she'll get him through it, they'll get through it together.

But she can't. And every breath she takes, or what is something like breathing, shreds her lungs, tears her apart just a bit more, over and over again until she isn't recognisable.

If James is there, his arms are around her, his fingers trembling violently as they press into her skin, or whatever her body is made of, assuming it can be called a body. He's whispering in her ear, enraged, gut-wrenching things, confirming the inhumanity of it all, letting her know that she isn't the only one that feels this, this deep, aggressive, all-consuming, crushing need to be there for their son.

That she isn't the only one who burns with the hatred and rage and regret that fills them now because they can't be.

He isn't telling her it's okay, because he knows that it isn't.

He isn't saying that he'll get through it, because they don't know.

They have no say in the matter.

But they're standing there watching him throw things, hearing his voice crack with the strain of screaming that he doesn't care, that he can't care anymore, that he would rather _die_ than continue to feel this, and they can't believe that after all these years, after everything, that he has to feel everything they felt, that life is no different, no better for him, after everything they'd hoped.

They wanted him to have _everything_ , and they're watching him collapse under the strain of losing it all.

Her hands are balled into fists, clenched around James' shirt, desperate to feel like she's holding onto something, _anything_ that will tether her to whatever it is they're standing on. It gives her something to do with the hands that are quaking because all she wants is to take the lunascope from his hands, grab him, and press him to her, the squeeze all of _this_ out of him. She can't make him better, can't end this for him, but she wants to, she wants to so desperately that she feels like she's trembling out of her fucking skin and even when James tightens his arms around her, buries his hand in her hair, she can't stop.

If she can cry, this is when the tears finally break through.

Watching their son collapse in the middle of the office, watching him tear himself apart with guilt and rage and depression and hatred, so much hatred, it becomes so much that she doesn't want to look anymore, doesn't want to watch this happen to him. But it's all she can do, because she can't be there for him, she can't help him, she can't wrap her arms around him and hold him up, help him stand against the universe that's pressing in upon him, harder and harder every moment, and so she stays because she doesn't know what else to do.

They didn't bring him into the world for this.

They didn't bring him into the world so that this would be his future, so that he would have to carry this burden, feel this strain, feel like his bones are shattering, his skin is shredding where he stands. They didn't bring him into the world for this and she wants him to know that they never, not in a million lifetimes, wanted this, that they wanted so much more, something that wasn't even remotely like this, that was light and full of love and laughter and _more,_ but to tell him that, to tell him what their life could have looked like, seems like it will only make this worse.

And she can't tell him anyway, so it doesn't really matter.

But still, they want to make this better, they want to erase this, they want to make it so that he doesn't have to feel this. They want to protect him, because he's just a child, _their child,_ and no one should have to feel this, least of all their son who has already seen so much, suffered so much, all of it known, _intentional,_ and if there's blood in her veins, it's boiling with rage, because all of this could have been prevented, he could have been _spared,_ but he wasn't. He wasn't because they weren't there to protect him, because they made a stupid, idiotic choice, because they put their lives in the hands of a fucking coward, and now their son is crumbling in front of them and they aren't there to piece him back together.

Eventually, he sits down, he falls silent, he listens. He finds out that this is only just the beginning. That there is so much more expected of him, that _everything_ is expected of him, and just when they thought it was over, for now, their hearts burst open again.

If they're standing there, if they can see this, it's killing them.

But to everyone else, they're already gone, so it doesn't really matter.


End file.
